How to Become a Magician

by Max Freedom Long

Introduction

With the resurgence of interest in the unexplained phenomena,
whether called "Magic" or "New Age" or whatever, it is refreshing to
have the moderate and reasonable view of HUNA as a frame of
reference in examining not only the phenomena, but the entire structure
of man's make-up, and therefore the normal functioning of the psyche.
Max Freedom Long used the word "Magic" in the title of his first book
"Recovering the Ancient Magic" (1936), but he carefully defined the
word as he used it:
All the efforts to bring about changes without the use of
ordinary means known in general and to Science in its
own field fall under the classification of MAGIC.
Another definition is "the art of causing changes in consciousness at
will."
It will be noted at once that no reference is made to forcing
"supernatural" beings to do one's will or otherwise invoking some
extra-personal "spirit" or "guide." In the older series of research reports,
published under the title "HRA Bulletins," Dr. Long presented a
summary of so-called magical practices in light of Huna concepts,
written in his inimitable style, with just a touch of humor combined with
some serious and very practical instructions. This article, subtitled "A
Complete 'Course' in One Lesson," was originally published December
1, 1954 in "HRA Bulletin" No. 110, pp. 3-7.

How to Become a Magician

TO LEARN TO BECOME A MAGICIAN you will need to learn to use
some of your native talents which you may not as yet have taken time to
develop. There are several of these talents. Men and women have
demonstrated them all about us. Hardly anyone lacks latent psychic
abilities which may be trained and made to work in the performance of
magical operations. Telepathy is so easy to develope that many use it
without training. Ability to sense the presence of the beloved "dead" is
very common, and many have excellent mediumistic powers which
could enable them to perform that part of healing magic which depends
largely on spirit aid.

Step One

DEVELOPING THE HYPNOTIC WILL. Begin at once to learn to use
hypnotism, Mesmerism, and the two in combination. To do this you will
begin at once to practice accumulating mana (life force) surcharges.
When you can accumulate a very large surcharge, you can then
begin practicing to learn Mesmerism, which is causing the mana
surcharge to flow through your hands or along your line of vision into a
subject, carrying with it well-made mental pictures or thought-form
clusters (which you will have made in advance by the use of your "will").
If your mana, which is the vital force of the body, is sufficiently
accumulated and is discharged strongly into the subject, it will over-
power the basic self in him and force him to accept the mental pictures
as his own, then react to them. Healing magic is performed in this way.
The subject can be made to relax, to sleep, and so on. If the shock
of mana is sufficient, and the thought-form cluster made with enough
power, it can break up and replace complexes in the basic self of the
subject. If there are spirits fastened to the subject, and if he has been
brought to turn over a new leaf so that he will refuse to respond to the
promptings of the spirits, they may be driven out of him and hypnotically
commanded to stay away, after first being broken away by the Mesmeric
shock of the mana you have projected.
Be warned that if you project a surcharge and hurtful mental pictures
to or at a subject, and these fail to be accepted by his low self, or are
blocked from action by his High Self or by his spirit friends who may be
watching over him, the force and the mental picture will rebound, often
with greatly increased power, and lodge in your own basic self, making it
the victim. Use the evil eye or spell-casting methods at your peril. Also
be warned that all about you are witting and unwitting magicians who
may be consciously or unconsciously projecting mana and mental
images at you-- weak or strong, good or bad.
Begin at once to practice becoming hurtless and helpful in your
every thought and deed. Learn to radiate good and helpful and loving
thoughts and do all you can to do good. In this way you will soon build a
permanent wall of radiation around you which will act as a great magnet,
of which you are the center. It will attract the good by its positive pole
and repel the bad. If you suspect that many bad thought-form clusters of
sickness, bad luck, etc. or many spirits of an evil nature, are already
bothering you from former projections against you by magicians, or
because you have been bad enough to attract to yourself equally bad
spirits, begin at once to use this affirmation frequently:
"GOOD, GOOD, GOOD! I AM GOOD. I think only
good and helpful thoughts. I do good and eject all
hurtful deeds I try to find and throw our daily any
thoughts of hate, anger, greed, jealousy, and the
like. I now prove my unwavering determination to
swing completely over to the side of GOOD, by
DOING some good deed, no matter how small,
before continuing my day's activities."
THE ASPIRING MAGICIAN will do well to remember that most of his
or her daily tasks are performed to help others to some degree. If each
task is approached and blessed as a SERVICE or a good deed lovingly
done for others, the good will be true coin of the realm.

Step Two

STRENGTHEN YOUR WILL. This is a continuation of the step you
learned to take earlier. After you become proficient in the use of the
Mesmeric force or low mana, begin to strengthen your middle-self WILL,
or mana-mana. You must first take on a fair surcharge of low mana
because, without this being present in your body, the middle self
(conscious mind) cannot get enough of it to make up a batch of strong
will power. This power is developed by daily use of exercises of holding
your mind and full attention on something for as long as you are able.
Make a mental picture of the face of a loved one and hold it before your
minds eye without allowing the face to change in any way. When it
"slips" and begins to change or fade, rest a minute or two. Accumulate
a little more mana, and try again. Keep a watch by you and note how
long you can hold mental pictures. At first you may find a few seconds
your limit. When you have practiced daily for several years, you will be
able to hold the basic self to the task as long as five minutes, and will by
then have developed will power strong enough to create, by a few
minutes of this concentrated attention on a mental picture, POWERFUL
THOUGHT-FORM CLUSTERS which can be projected by the
Mesmeric method described in Step One.
If you wish to know whether you have a strong will now, test with the
Biometer (Note: this refers to the scale used for psychometric analysis
readings described in Max Freedom Long's book "Psychometric
Analysis," and the accompanying scale for measuring vital force.) Tests
made at intervals will show whether your practice is getting results. Be
warned that if you develop your hypnotic or middle-self will without at the
same time developing the ability to become GOOD and BETTER day by
da, you will soon have a very unbalanced biometric pattern and it will
begin to cause you much more breakdown and trouble.
Some imitation magicians- those not having been trained thoroughly
in Huna- use their hypnotism openly. Beware of these unless you have
obtained their signature, written with their own pen and with ink, and
have tested it on the Biometer to learn whether they are "black" or
"white" magicians. The black will show a perfect will-pattern but almost
no personality circle, or, if a circle shows, it will be counter-clockwise
and usually far from round.
In your own work as a budding magician, avoid the use of hypnotic
suggestion as something apart from the Mesmeric element. Use
Mesmerism as in Step One, with the hypnotic will simply as an adjunct to
aid in creating the very strong mental picture of the GOOD condition
which you wish to implant powerfully in the basic self of those whom you
help and heal. NEVER ADMIT THAT YOU ARE A MAGICIAN, just say
that you have a natural gift for healing and will be happy to try to use it
if the one needing help will turn over a new leaf, etc.
Helping others to turn over a new leaf and to become ready to be
healed is the GOOD DEED at its best. Remember this always.
TELEPATHIC OR PROJECTED MAGICAL HEALING is an important
part of this work. Contact must be established with the ones to be
helped. A hand-shake will string an aka thread between you which will
make it possible for your basic self to make contact at any time. Or the
basic self can follow the aka thread that is fastened to a signature
written in ink. This contact is telepathic in its nature, and you can send
with Mesmeric force a mental picture of healing which has been
constructed through the use of your WILL. Practice will enable you to
become more and more powerful as you go along. Also, results build up
slowly if the magical treatment is repeated over and over.

Step Three

RUBBING ALADDIN'S LAMP. No magician should be without a
good Aladdin's Lamp. Go to a junk shop at once and buy one. Take it
home and accumulate as large a surcharge of mana as you can. Then
build up your will to a high point of concentration and create a mental
picture of what you wish to have the Genie of the Lamp do for you
when you rub the Lamp and he appears to do your bidding. Millions of
people in the past twenty centuries may have rubbed a Lamp without
getting the slightest response. Their trouble has been that they did not
know that the "oil" needed to fill this type of Lamp is not oil at all, but
is a large surcharge of mana. So build up your surcharge, make your
mental image, and then rub your Lamp. If you don't have a Lamp,
remember that it is only a symbol-- the symbol of LIGHT. Just think of a
genie who embodies all the goodness and so all the LIGHT you can
imagine. Then rub something! Rub your hands together and affirm:
"I am now calling to the Spirit of Light who
remains ever aware of me and ever ready
to come to me at my request when I fill myself
full of the mana which is the force or oil which
enables the Lamp of the Light to become lighted
and cast its rays down to enlighten me on this
darkened level of being. I affirm with full faith that
I now believe that my call has been heard and
that the Spirit of Light above me has come and
stands ready to receive the oil to be used for
helping and guiding and illuminating me and those
whom I will help. I now send flowing upward along
the connecting shadowy cord a strong flow of mana.
With it I send my carefully and powerfully constuct-
ed mental picture of the condition which I ask be
brought about."
Many aspiring students have given up at this point because they
could not see the Spirit of Light. This is greatly to be regretted, for the
Spirit is always there and will always accept the oil and begin shedding
helpful light. A daily replenishing of the Light which stands before the
altar of your Innermost Being may be needed if the request you make
demands much magical work. All experienced magicians know that the
instant and complete performance of a task by a Spirit of the Lamp is
possible only at rare intervals. They are content to work for many days
to get the full task completed.
BE WARNED at this point that if you attempt to use the magic of the
Lamp without first purifying yourself with many lustrations and
fumigations, drawings of signs and magical circles about you, there will
be grave danger that you will evoke the spirit of a dead person-- a spirit
just as uncleansed and tainted with evil as you may happen to be. If you
are greedy and plan selfish gain, the spirit may be equally so and may
take your surcharge of mana and turn to bite the hand that feeds it.
Keep in mind the fact that all fumigations, incense burnings, washings,
and rituals of cleansing are, just like the "oil" and the "Lamp," merely
symbolic. These things, when read about by a magician in a book of
instructions tell him that a cleansing of his thoughts and heart is
indicated. Go back to Step One and check what was revealed to you
concerning GOOD.
Down the centuries magicians have written out their knowledge in
the form of "evocations" and "incantations," also "invocations."
Invariably they have veiled the inner meanings. For this reason the
student must take care not to be caught in the foolish trap in which so
many have been caught. In the semi-secret orders in Europe and
America even today, they are drawing magic circles, performing strange
physical rites, making fumigations, compounding absurd mixtures of
frog's eyes and the leaves of plants gathered in a cemetery on the night
of the full moon, and so on. Rare books containing rituals and formulae
bring hundred of dollars, and men and women gather to study and to try
to use them, always ending with nothing accomplished.
If the student has seen such books, and there are many of them,
dating from the times of early Egypt on, be warned that the long
repetition of invocations with the exact pronunciation of Names of
Power are quite useless to the uninitiated. The magicians of all ages
have piled one absurdity upon another in their writings, all for the
purpose of causing the greedy outsider to waste his time, if he is that
foolish, trying to perform rites which cannot be performed, and to learn to
pronounce unpronounceable "names" without number. The famous
"Seventy-two Names of God" are part of this blind. So are the endless
names given to supposed gods and demons and spirits, good or bad.
LOOK BEHIND THIS VEIL OF SECRECY FOR THE THREE
ELEMENTS WHICH ARE SYMBOLIZED IN ALL TRUE MAGIC! Watch
for the veiled mention of the three selves and their three mana forces.
Watch for the inner cleansing rather than the outer. You can call a spirit,
be it bright and good and helpful, or bad and strong and dangerous,
provided you have made a contact with it and so have established an
aka thread along which you can send a telepathic call-- a flow of mana
with the picture of its hearing and coming to you. But just to know the
name of a spirit and to speak it is a waste of time. There may be a
thousand spirits bearing that same name, and besides, with no contact
already made, your call will be empty. Be warned, however, that if some
spirit happens to be near, be it good or bad, it may hear and accept the
call, taking all you have to offer, if it is bad, and perhaps in the end
taking your body away from you. Evil spirits may remain bound to the
earth for centuries, and may become most wise in the matter of doing
evil for and against the living magician who is even a fraction as evil.
You have read of "sympathetic magic" in which like produces like-- a
sprinkling of water causing a rain, and the pouring out of an oblation of
wine to the gods bringing about an outpouring of good things to you in
return. This is also a blind to veil away the ignorant. Like brings like
only when a powerfully constructed mental picture is presented with
much mana to the Spirit of Light so that on this likeness the Spirit may
construct for you a reality. The old fertility rites supposed to bring
increase in crops and flocks were of use only if they served to picture
the desired things and to furnish through emotion some mana to
empower the gods.

Step Four

AMULETS, WALLS OF PROTECTION, ETC. Having you that all
drawing of magic or ritual circles, pentagrams, and such things belongs
to the outer or symbolic side of magic, it needs to be said that a few
physical things can be used by the magician as points around which to
build mental pictures or images with a mixture of aka substance,
thought-forms and mana.
TO MAKE A RABBIT'S FOOT EFFECTIVE, for instance, it is not
enough to preserve such a foot and carry it on your person. The foot
must be gazed upon and concentrated upon a few minutes each day
for a number of days, and the student must picture the foot as a center
about which he is building layers, day after day, of that plaster made of
thought, mana and aka substance. As all mental pictures are made of
these three ingredients, and as a mental picture is as enduring as any
strong memory (which is, in actuality, constructed of these three
elements), the picture of a radiating center of GOOD surrounding the
foot of the rabbit soon becomes a very real thing. But the foot must be
encased in thoughts of GOOD FOR ALL, not just for its owner, or it will
be valueless. THIS IS A SECRET WHICH FEW KNOW. To become a
center which will attract good and ward off evil, the foot must be used in
connection with the bringing of good to others as well as to the owner,
and it must be used when possible to ward off or remove evil in the
same way.
ANY OBJECT, LUCKY PIECE, OR AMULET may be treated in the
same way. Shrines are centers into which GOOD has been poured in
this way by a saint or magician and made strong and enduring to radiate
back to the worshiper all the good he radiates to it in worship. Such a
center may be filled daily with fresh mana, and the good spirits may be
invited to come to it daily to obtain enough mana to give them power to
perform good deeds on the mental and physical levels. Like birds
coming to refresh themselves in the bird bath in your garden, and then
going to clear out hurtful insects, so the good spirits will soon begin to
come, taking the water of mana and looking to see what requests you
have left with the mana for them to fulfill. Your requests are mental
pictures of things you desire the spirit friends to bring about if they can.
Pour a mana surcharge into your magic center, along with the mental
pictures of good conditions desired for yourself and friends. The spirits
will soon be coming daily to take the mana and to assist. But try not to
disappoint them by forgetting to leave mana and good requests for them
daily, otherwise they will soon scatter and go elsewhere. Just as a
center of good can be made in this way, a center of bad may be
established if one is not careful. The student who makes a rabbit's foot
center with the desire to get more than he gives, is guilty of breaking the
first rule of magic-- that of being greedy and hurtful to the extent that he
wishes to take things from others so that he may enjoy benefits. Keep
cleansed yourself. Keep your center clear of all things not fully GOOD
for everyone. You cannot steal and hold good things for long. Payment
must eventually be made. On the other hand, one can buy almost any
good thing with the coin of good thoughts accompanied by good deeds.
A "wall of protection" can be built around yourself or a loved one in
the same way with the help of the Spirit of the Light. Put only good into
the wall and it will allow only good to pass in and out through it... And so
ends the lesson. Here is MAGIC for you... for the taking.
--Max Freedom Long

The Huna Fellowship was founded by Max Freedom Long in 1945.
Huna (tm) is an internationally registered trademark of Huna
Research, Inc., the organization which coordinates the teaching,
research, and practice of this ancient system recovered during over fifty
years of research by Max Freedom Long (1890-1971) from the ancient
traditions of Hawaii.
The Huna Way of Life contains elements of philosophy, psychology,
and religion, offering practical, easy-to-learn methods of personal goal
attainment and spiritual growth.
This not-for-profit organization is supported entirely by annual dues
(US$35 per year) and other donations, all of which are tax-exempt under
Section 501(c)(3) of IRS Code.
Huna is a gift. The President, the members of the Board of Directors,
and Seminar/Workshop teachers WORK ON A VOLUNTARY BASIS
ONLY. All revenue generated from donations, courses, goes to the
support of HUNA. Your financial support is earnestly solicited and
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Huna Research has only one salaried employee to carry out general
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Huna does NOT demand that you give up any belief or religious
affiliation that is consistent with your own personal experience. Member-
ship is open to any interested person. Aloha nui loa.